More than one of us has completely missed important plot points in a film because we’ve been ogling at a dress, I guarantee it. Fashion and film were made for each other.

Sew Iconic, a new book from Thunder Bay Press, marries a love of film with a love of sewing to bring ten iconic dresses from the silver screen within the reach of seamstresses like you and I.

My favorites are Keira Knightley’s 1930s dress from Atonement, Rita Hayworth’s black sheath and Grace Kelly’s blue chiffon gown from To Catch a Thief, but with ten dresses to choose from there’s sure to be something for everyone.

Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman

Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s

Jennifer Grey in Dirty Dancing

Marilyn Monroe in The Seven Year Itch

Keira Knightley in Atonement

Catherine Zeta Jones in Chicago

Grace Kelly in To Catch a Thief

Rita Hayworth in Gilda

Faye Dunaway in The Thomas Crown Affair

Kate Winslet in Titanic

This spiral-bound (thank you!) handbook includes a full size pattern for each dress and masses of photos, information and tips. In fact, what I like best about Sew Iconic is the sheer volume of background info that accompanies each dress.

Not just a set of instructions for sewing, this book fills you in on the movie, the actress, the designer and, most importantly, how to style the dress to turn heads.

To win your very own copy of Sew Iconic, leave a comment below – which dress would you sew up first and why?

The winner will be chosen on Wednesday, July 4th. As always on WeSewRetro, this giveaway is open to entrants worldwide.

Oh, I have always wanted Marilyn Monroe’s beautiful white dress from “The Seven Year Itch” – so pure and flowing. Regarding the stunning Atonement dress, I just bought a painful amount of bottle green crepe de chine with that very dress in mind *soon, my precious*

Julia Roberts’ dress from “Pretty Woman!” It is spunky and fashionable – would look great no matter what one’s generation, X- or Boomer. This cheer-full dress would be my first project from that wonderful book!

I’d be making the Keira Knightly dress from Attonement as soon as the book arrived! I’m pretty sure I only saw the film so I could see that dress in action. Second project would be a toss up between Grace Kelly’s ‘To Catch A Thief’ dress (Edith Head design?) and Rita Hayworth’s ‘Gilda’ dress.

I would make Kate Winslet’s dress because that dress was the first one I saw where I forgot about the movie to watch the dress. As a knitter and a sewer I constantly have to rewind movies because I have gotten so caught up in seeing the dress/sweater/scarf/shawl from different angles as the character moves through the scene. The dress that Rose wears to dinner is one of the most stunning garments I have ever seen, and one that could actually picture wearing myself. Now I just have to find a doomed ship…

Sorry, but I don’t think this is a very good book. I took a look at it in the store a couple of weeks ago and put it back without buying. The information and background stuff may be wonderful, but I think the actual patterns provided leave a lot to be desired. Some of them don’t bear much resemblance to the originals. “Inspired by” would be a better way to describe them. And I think a user would likely have to grade the pattern up or down unless she happens to match the size provided. Certainly a good sewist should be able to use the book and patterns as a springboard to her creativity and design skills. Bear that in mind and don’t expect patterns that replicate the iconic dresses.

I think that the titanic dress would be nice to sew – it’s so unusual with it’s draping and lace sleeves. Wonderful! And the Kiera dress have such an interesting cut – to find a sewing pattern for that might be hard.

I would definitely start with Julia Robert’s dress from Pretty Woman, because I’ve actually got that one on a someday-maybe sewing list, along with a BurdaStyle pattern that would be a good starting point and a link to a brown and white polka dot cotton for sale on myfabrics.co.uk 🙂

Rita Hayworth – that woman was a goddess but I am sure it was more than to do with the dress! I would be the happiest person alive if I could look anything remotely like her in any dress but in this one – the world would be my oyster. XXX

I love the Faye Dunaway dress from The Thomas Crown Affair – asymmetric, buttons, 60’s style – everything I love. To be honest I would love every single dress here (but I’m afraid it would just show up that I am no Grace Kelly!).

I think I would love to make them all. But the one dress I really want to make is the famous Marilyn Monroe dress. Every time one of my dresses or skirts gets a gust of wind I think of Marilyn. I have to admit I’m a bit of an addict. I’m trying to find every movie she ever made on dvd, even if she’s just in it for 5 minutes.
So I would looooove the dress 😉

I would definitely love to sew Keira Knightly’s dress. I absolutely adored this dress when I first saw it, in the movie, I almost coveted it. The design is beautiful and the colour is amazing. I want one exactly like it.

This would be really hard to pick…I always wanted Kate’s dress in Titanic, and I would love to do Catherine’s from Chicago too! I would just love to have this in my library to reference to any time I wanted!

I would love to make an evening dress for our company Christmas party and I adore the Atonement dress and Rita Hayworth’s dress. For some reason though, I think they might be a little too advaced for me to start with.

For the first thing I would make I think I would stick with either Dirty dancing dress, Marylin’s dress, or the pretty woman dress. Because they don’t seem as complicated (though I could be wrong) and I could wear them more often (all the time even).

Okay so that wasn’t a very good answer considering I love all of the dresses.

I am making a decision now and really quickly before I change my mind am going……Dirty Dancing

My ultimate dream dress is Grace Kelly’s white dress in To Catch a Thief. Considering my sewing level is not quite there, I’d probably tackle the Jennifer Gray/Dirty Dancing dress. I’m a dancer, so it would get quite a few spins out on the dance floor 🙂

My father bought me a version of the Pretty woman dress when I was in college. It is one of my favorites. They are all so beautiful! I don’t think I could settle on just one. So sewing marathon, here I come!

oh what a fun topic! If you have not seen “The Best of Everything,” I highly recommend it. Keep an eye out for Hope Lange’s outfit on her wild bender night. There’s, of course, always Kim Novak’s amazing and iconic white coat in Alfred Hitchcock’s “Vertigo.”

I have to be practical. I have no where at all to wear the gorgeous ballgowns, but the dress Faye Dunaway wore in “The Thomas Crown Affair,” now that’s something I could dress up in, and even make in a sort of kicky super tunic style to wear with leggings for fun.
The dress that distracts me every time in movies is the green velvet Edith Head dress Rosemary Clooney wears in the cocktail party scene in “White Christmas.” I am still not exactly sure what happens in that scene.

I would definitely choose Keira Knightley’s Atonement dress. For weeks after I watched that movie for the first time I couldn’t stop thinking about that beautiful green dress! I love the backless-ness of it. 🙂

Oh my days this is too serendipitous! I have been desperate to make that Pretty Woman dress for ages and was hoping to do it for and upcoming sewing course I’m doing. I managed to snared the last 3m of this gorgeous chocolate polka dot crepe but sadly couldn’t find a pattern. I absolutely fell in love with the dress after watching the film not long after I started learning to sew last year and so that’s the dress I would make 🙂

It would have to be Jennifer Grey’s Dirty Dancing dress. I watch that movie over and over! Plus, being realistic, that’s the only one that would look even halfway good on my 5′ 2″ frame. Thanks for the great giveaway. If I don’t win, I’ll be buying the book right away.

All gorgeous, stunning dresses, of course, but having read Atonement before seeing the movie I thought Keira Knightly’s green dress was a perfect fit. And the green color is just absolutely beautiful. I would love to wear that dress.

Good grief! What a decision to have to make. I would probably make Baby’s dress first. I was a competing ballroom dancer at one time and am looking to start up again (about to approach the grand age of 60)! That dress was made for a dance floor and I could make it for a fraction of the cost it would cost to have it made!!!! Sign me up!

Well, that Grace Kelly dress is unbelievable, but I do not have an event that requires a formal gown at the moment. I think I would go with Marilyn’s dress because I have not made a halter dress for quite a while, and it just may be time!

Wow! So many comments about my book! Thank you to everyone who has taken the trouble to make such positive and delightful points… it makes all the research and hard work worth while 🙂 I do take the point though that they are more of an ‘Inspired by’ than actual faithful copies – although I have tried really hard to make them as authentic as possible – it’s just that we ordinary mortals don’t have big movie budgets on the whole and I’ve tried to create patterns that can be made on a more modest budget. I hope that’s OK with everyone! Cheers one and all! Lizx

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